NCAA women | UConn looms again for Kentucky

Possible rematchof '12 regional final

Mar. 19, 2013

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From C-J and AP dispatches

The University of Kentucky women’s basketball team is headed to New York to begin its quest for the Final Four.

The Wildcats (27-5) on Monday night were named the No. 2 seed in the Bridgeport (Conn.) Regional and will face 15th-seeded Navy (21-11) in the first round in Queens, N.Y., Sunday at 12:05 EDT.

“We’re excited to be in the tournament again, and to get a 2-seed for the second year in a row shows the team accomplished a lot over the season,” UK coach Matthew Mitchell said.

St. John’s (18-12), which is seeded 10th, is the site host and will play No. 7 Dayton (27-2) at approximately 2:30 p.m. Sunday in the other first-round matchup of the pod.

The two winners will meet next Tuesday for a Sweet 16 trip to Bridgeport.

Mitchell said the team looks forward to playing in New York, where UK players Jennifer O’Neill and Jelleah Sidney are from.

“I’m excited to be going home,” O’Neill said, “and for everyone to see us play, and a lot of my teammates have never been there. … It’s going to be an amazing trip.”

Top-seeded Connecticut looms in the top half of the Bridgeport bracket.

The Huskies defeated UK 80-65 in last year’s regional final.

“It would be great to play them again because it would mean we’re in the final eight,” Mitchell said. “There’s a lot of basketball before that matchup, but we would be very excited to play in the Elite Eight again. It would be a tough road because there are some excellent teams in our bracket.”

“I think it’s definitely interesting (that UConn is the same regional again),” senior A’dia Mathies said. “We watched film actually today on the game and how it slipped away little by little. But we know we’re a different team this year. We feel that if we do the things that are necessary, the things we should be doing, we should definitely make the Final Four.”

The third-ranked Huskies, who lost both the Big East regular-season and tournament titles to Notre Dame, will face 16th-seeded Idaho (17-15) from the Western Athletic Conference on Saturday.

The Huskies (29-4) are again on the same side of the bracket with Notre Dame, setting up a possible third straight meeting in the national semifinals. The Irish have won the previous two and have beaten UConn seven of the last eight times the teams have played, including three times this season.

“I’m sure they want to play us just as much as we want to play them,” UConn forward Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis said. “They are trying to prove that they are the top team and we’re trying to prove that we can beat them.”

Connecticut’s only other loss this season was to top-ranked Baylor. The Huskies beat eight other Top 25 teams this season.